Fashion Legend Leah Gottlieb Dies at 94

This post first appeared on The Sisterhood blog at The Forward.

Gottex fashion house, Tel Aviv, 1961

We take lycra and hard-cup bras in bathing suits for granted. But at one time, they actually had to be introduced to beachwear fashion. The person to do so was Gottex founder Leah Gottlieb, who died on November 17 in Tel Aviv at age 94.

Gottlieb, a Holocaust survivor who arrived penniless to Israel in 1949, built a spandex-fueled international empire along with her husband Armin (who died in 1995) and daughters Judith (who died in 2003) and Miriam. Gottlieb, who was born and raised in Hungary, hid with her young daughters from the Nazis while her husband was sent to a forced labor camp. After the war, the couple lived briefly in Czechoslovakia before moving to the new Jewish State.

After realizing that making raincoats (as Armin’s family had done in Hungary) was not a profitable business in sundrenched Israel, the couple soon switched their focus to swimwear. Armin took care of the business side while Gottlieb, known not only for her prodigious talent but also her incredible work ethic, poured her energy into designing the garments.

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